Of course. I am not casting blame on individuals but expressing my disappointment that something I regard as objectively/technically superior as well as personally rewarding has not achieved greater penetration among serious listeners
Understandable!
Since you quoted Newman - who was blaming audiophiles - saying you’ve been saying the same thing, I figured I could address both of your posts.
I have heard this before and I wonder if it has to do with what individuals want from their systems. I listen almost exclusively to classical music recorded in real time (mostly) and in public performance spaces and the closer I get to a recreation or (please fool me) simulation of that event, the happier I am. For that, multichannel makes a significant difference. When I listen to music that I care less deeply about, including almost all non-classical, I find the effect of multichannel no more than "cool and somewhat different."
Yes, I agree It’s clear individuals want different things from their systems. But I’m not sure that it’s necessarily based on the choice of music. As you know, there are plenty of audiophiles who are focussed on classical music, or at least listen to a lot of classical music, but who choose two channel.
I love orchestral music (along with many other genres) and I enjoy it on my surround system, but still tend to prefer it on my two channel system. I find some level of immersion increased in surround, but I don’t find a particular leap in “ believability.”
I get the vast majority of what I find enjoyable important and convincing (with obvious caveats), even with orchestral music, from my channel system.
If I’m listening to some of the excellent recordings I have of orchestra performing Bernard Herrmann pieces, I find my two channel speakers spread wide apart, open up what appears to be (depending on the recording) a vast space in which I am hearing the instruments. When those Herrmann low woodwinds growl I can feel it, when the brass sections come in full power, there is a wonderful, powerful and density and acoustic power, and their brass harmonics light up the acoustics of the hall in ways that I find to be quite reminiscent of the real thing, and like I am to a degree participating in that acoustic space.
When I go to surround… yes there’s a tiny bit more hall sound sent to the surround channels. So it wraps around me more.
But it doesn’t make some big leap in audio quality or realism for me.
I know what it’s like to switch the surround sound to two channel and hear the effect of the surround content disappearing.
That’s a bit more obvious in an apples to apples comparison just using my surround system. And part of that is because my L/C/R speakers are further away from me near the projection screen. So the stereo sound is further away from me and less immersive.
Where as my two channel speakers are pulled well out from the wall much closer to me, and they create more immersion.
I sometimes hook up those two channel speakers to the rest of my Home Theatre system, in which I can do the same comparisons: music and surround, versus collapsing it to stereo, and in such cases the difference is significantly smaller. I still maintain a really compelling sense of spaciousness and depth and immersion even in stereo.
If I had seven of the same speakers that I use for my two channel music listening, surrounding me, well, that could certainly change the game.
But I could neither afford that nor of course, could I manage it in my room. And I am super picky about my loudspeakers especially for two channel, and I would rather use my money to get exactly the sound I want from the two channel, versus spreading that money across something like seven loudspeakers of either lesser equality, or simply that I don’t like as much as the two channel speakers I use.
So that’s how my priorities shake out. Absolutely love music on my surround system. Watching musical performances on that system is one of my favourite things to do. But doesn’t replace my two channel system.
I don't understand this sentence. Can you correct/restate it for me, please?
Sorry, that was a completely mangled sentence from voice dictation.
I tried to say: I don’t think the numbers of Luddite “anti-surround/anti-digital” audiophiles are relevant enough to be blamed for the lack of surround sound (music) acceptance.